Władysław Moes

Who is Władysław Moes?

Władysław Moes was a Polish nobleman and inspiration of Tadzio in Thomas Mann’s novella Death in Venice.

Władysław Moes was born in the Moes Palace near Wierbka, in southern Poland. He was the second son of six children of Alexander Julius Moes, a large land and factory owner and benefactor, and his wife Countess Janina Miaczynska, and he was also the grandson of Christian August Moes, a big Polish industrialist of Dutch origin. In 1911, he spent the holidays in Lido of Venice, in the Grand Hotel des Bains. There he attracted the attention of the German writer Thomas Mann, who used him for the inspiration of Tadzio – a character of his novel Death in Venice, published in 1912. In 1920 he took part as a volunteer in the Polish-Soviet War. Later he ran the property estate inherited from his father. In 1935 he married a noblewoman - Anna Belina-Brzozowska and had two children, Alexander and Maria.

In 1939 after the German invasion of Poland, he was taken as a prisoner of war and sent to Oflag where he spent almost six years. At the establishment of the communist regime in Poland he was deprived of his entire property. He was forced to earn his living mainly as a translator. In 1964 he gave an interview to the Polish translator of Thoman Mann’s works Andrzej Dołegowski which was published in German magazine Twen revealing that he himself was the inspiration of the writer’s character: